Dark Times

Chapter Twenty-One

As he carried me back to the camp- what was left of our clothes now back on- I felt the oddly compelling need to say sorry. As if I'd done something wrong. Perhaps I had taken a little more than I'd given. He'd fucked my boobs to merry hell and back. All I'd given him in return was trouble.

I knew he wasn't happy. He ducked down for me to scramble up onto his back, grabbed my inner thighs and that was it. No other words had been exchanged since. Nothing.

I dropped my head into his neck, my wet hair fanning out and blocking his vision. Even then, he didn't say anything. He just dealt with it, soldiering on.

I couldn't bring myself to actually say I was sorry. Not in so many words. I wasn't the feelings kind of person, y'know. Maybe I'd frown at a funeral, but that was it. I didn't do more. But I still felt oddly bad.

It was that stupid mate bond.

I listened to his breathing and breathed in his scent.

Then- in a completely out of character moment- I decided to cut him a little bit of slack. Just the teensiest, tiniest bit. Softly, barely at all, I placed my lips to the skin of his neck. His hold on my thighs tightened. My lips drew higher. Against me, he tensed.

"Don't play with me."

"I'm not. I'm trying to..."

"You're trying to what- torture me some more?"

I sighed. It'd been a dumb idea anyway. My best ideas came under pressure.

"I'm trying to say sorry without actually saying it." There. I said it. Not as explicitly as what was conventional, but he knew now what I was trying to say no less. He couldn't hold me accountable any longer. "You don't seem like such a bad guy. You probably don't deserve all of this shit. You deserve someone who'll..."

"Stop talking."

"Yeah, probably."

"I meant shut up, Lorelei."

"Oh."

"I'm not mad at you because you didn't want to give yourself over to temptation."

"Who said anything about temptation?"

"Would you shut up a minute?" I sucked my teeth in, wincing. "I'm not mad at you for that. And you were right. I don't want our first time being intimate together to be something crude on the rocks under a waterfall. The first time will be on a bed." So sure. Maybe I could give him one time before I ran. "If I fucked you, I wouldn't be able to stop myself from marking you." Or not. "If I mark you, you can't leave me. I know that's all you think about. You get this look on your face, and your eyes go wayward. You're not like normal mates. Normal mates feel the sparks immediately. They can't keep their hands off of each other. You seem determined to make this as hard for me as you can. But I wouldn't change you. I need you to be difficult and challenging but—But I need you to let me be your mate too. I wish you'd tell me what your problem with this is. You keep giving me these empty excuses about some mates not working out. You won't even give me your favourite colour. Everything I know about you is what I've been told by other people. I don't even know your last name."

He took a breather, his fingers loosening then tightening once more.

"I don't know yours either."

"Fervidus."

A second ticked by. Then I snorted.

"Are you kidding? Your name is Alpha Aidan Fervidus of the Fervidus territories?"

He scoffed, rolling his neck on his shoulders. "The land was named after my family." Of course it was. "Will you tell me yours?"

He couldn't have chosen something easier. Like- I don't know- my birthday or something.